Facebook Messenger bots let you send money with TransferWise

The TransferWise bot makes it possible to transfer money from Messenger

TransferWise

Sending money internationally can now be done while chatting online with friends and family as money exchange service TransferWise launches its new Facebook Messenger bot today.

Money can be sent between people in the UK, US, Canada, Australia, and Europe directly through the messaging app. As TransferWise gains feedback, it will eventually expand the service to more than 50 countries and 600 routes.

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While Scott Miller, head of partnerships at TransferWise, says the bot will take the same amount of time as using the company's website to complete a transfer, the convenience of being able to stay within the app rather than navigating to another website was a big motivator for developing the system.

“The benefit is people are spending an awful lot of time in Facebook Messenger and they don’t want to take that time to close that app, go into another app, sign in and make that transfer," he tells WIRED.

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“So the time comparison, if it was a horse race and both people are on the apps from start to finish, is about the same. But it saves them time and energy because they don’t have to switch out of the places that they’re already communicating with the friends and family that they want to send money to."

The bot works by asking four questions: where do you want to send money from, where is the money going, who is it going to, and how will it be funded. The sender then hits 'confirm' to finish the process.

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“The bot can ask whatever questions, the person can ask whatever questions, it allows a conversation between the bot and the customer and the history is there forever,” Miller says.

As well as sending money, the bot can set up rate alerts. A notification of the exchange rates for a person’s chosen currencies will be sent to their phone each weekday. TransferWise offers a mid-market exchange rate and avoids foreign exchange fees, to make international money transfers less expensive.

Miller says Facebook Messenger was chosen to launch the service because Facebook’s bot platform is more advanced, and it has the biggest overlap with TransferWise customers.

“It's a very lightweight, super easy to interact with TransferWise on a messaging platform that people are interacting with all the time,” Miller says.

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"This integration into Facebook is just one piece of the TransferWise Everywhere strategy that is driven off our API product that works for messaging [systems] works for banks and works for businesses."

Speaking at WIRED Money in 2015, TransferWise founder and executive chairman Taavet Hinrikus said the banking industry was ‘ripe for disruption,’ and the industry was headed for tough times as banking became more user-centric.

Recent reports suggest TransferWise has more than one million customers, is moving £800 million across its platform each month and has an 8 percent share of the UK market.